Tracking COVID in N.H. – 3 of 4 goals now met
The Concord Monitor is keeping track of four measurements often cited as indicators of how the COVID-19 pandemic is progressing. This is our third weekly update. When all four measures are met consistently we’ll have a good argument that the pandemic is under...
Adding broadband to electric coop falls 2% short in vote
An effort to add broadband internet access to the official role of New Hampshire Electric Coop fell about two percentage points short in an election among members, but backers are still hopeful. “Because it came so close and because of strong advocates elected to the...
A hard rain is gonna fall (often) & dams need to get ready
Climate change is bringing more incidences of heavy rains - not necessarily more precipitation overall, just more concentrated downpours. That's a problem for dams built under the assumption that past rainfall patterns will continue. I've got a story in today's...
Bill would pay home batteries for peak shaving and avoiding power-line buildout
There's a bill in the N.H. legislature that seems to support at-home, behind-the-meter battery storage. I say "seems" because the devil is in the detais and when lawmaking and utility regulation overlap, the details get too detailed for me to be sure I understand them...
Check out the Science Cafe N.H. on flying cars
I can't wait for Science Cafe New Hampshire to return to three-dimensional space, but there's one advantage to a virtual SCNH viewed through the computer screen: Videos! At last night's SCNH, that mean videos of flying cars! Woo-hoo! You can watch the whole thing here...
Speaking of flying cars, ‘roadable aircraft’ get OK from N.H. Senate
The New Hampshire Senate passed a whole slew of bills yesterday, trying to catch up with COVID-related delays. Included in an overall transportation bill was HB-1517, "An Act Relative to Roadable Aircraft." I wrote about this bill last year, but it has morphed since...
‘Mouth-based activities’
Legal documents are notoriously hard to read but that's not because lawyers are bad writers - not entirely, anyway. Anybody who has ever tried to write a document with some legal heft knows that it's hard to develop wording that conveys exactly what you mean and...
Four numbers (plus 2) to track COVID-19 in N.H.
I'm looking at four data points each week (decline in new cases, low absolute number of new cases, high population testing, low positive rate of tests) to measure how New Hampshire is doing with the COVID-19 pandemic. You can see this week's report here. As a little...
The confusing dance of sunsets, sunrises and day length
As I write this (June 14th) sunrise has occurred at the earliest clock time of the year - 5:05:33 a.m. in Concord, a tiny bit later where I am, an hour south. But it's not the longest day of the year, meaning the most hours of daylight - that doesn't happen until the...
MIT dumps Elsevier, giant science-journal publisher, over article access
There's been a lot of grumbling in recent years from researchers about the business and information-sharing practices of the companies that publish scholarly journals: The basic complaint is that while scientists write the articles and do peer review for free,...
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Science Cafe NHAbout Granite Geek
Dave Brooks has written a science/tech column since 1991 – yes, that long – and has written this blog since 2006, keeping an eye on topics of geekish interest in and around New Hampshire, from software to sea level rise, population dynamics to printing (3-D, of course). He moderates monthly Science Cafe NH discussions, beer in hand, and discusses the geek world regularly on WKXL radio in Concord.
Brooks earned a bachelor’s degree in mathematics but got lost on the way to the Ivory Tower and ended up in a newsroom. He has reported for newspapers from Tennessee to New England. Rummage through his bag of awards you’ll find oddities like three Best Blog prizes from the New Hampshire Press Association and a Writer of the Year award from the N.H. Farm and Forest Bureau, of all places. He joined the Concord Monitor in 2015.